


Queen

by CC_Writes_Stuff



Category: Fire Emblem: Fuukasetsugetsu | Fire Emblem: Three Houses
Genre: Chess, Chess Metaphors, Dark Claude von Riegan, Derogatory Language, Diplomacy, Discrimination, Established My Unit | Byleth/Claude von Riegan, F/M, Family Drama, It’s subtle but its there, Liberal use of Claude’s real name, Mentioned Golden Deer Students (Fire Emblem), Mentioned My Unit | Byleth, POV Alternating, POV Outsider, Period-Typical Racism, Politics, Post-Canon, Post-Golden Deer Route (Fire Emblem: Three Houses), Post-War, Sexism, Xenophobia, maybe?? Im tagging it to be safe, not that i know shit about chess
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-22
Updated: 2020-11-22
Packaged: 2021-03-10 03:35:52
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,077
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27567598
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/CC_Writes_Stuff/pseuds/CC_Writes_Stuff
Summary: Claude forgets to put on his gloves and to hide his Byleth’s ring to him from his cousins. They make assumptions, bad ones, ones that he can’t let slide, ones they think will get a rise out of him.They don’t know that the person who returned from the war is different from the prince he was when he left.
Relationships: Claude von Riegan & Original Character(s), My Unit | Byleth/Claude von Riegan
Comments: 8
Kudos: 100





	Queen

**Author's Note:**

> this came to me one day and wouldn’t leave me alone until I wrote it so here we go

Claude von Reigan was a lot of things.

He was the leader of the Leicester Alliance. The former house leader of the Golden Deer. The Master Tactican. The royal pain in Lorenz Hellman Gloucester’s side.

He’s also Khalid Nejem, firstborn of Tiana von Reigan and Javed Nejem, crown prince of Almyra, the Moon Child, the Bastard Heir.

Claude von Reigan has friends. He had Hilda, his partner in crime, Lorenz, the tolerable pain in his ass, Lysithea, his second little sister, Leonie, the annoying older sister he never got to have, Ignatz, who helps him see the world in a different light, Marianne, who helps him talk through his fears, Raphael, the person who’s always up for a spar or a feast or both, and Cyril, the little brother he never had.

He has Byleth Eisner, his Teach, his friend, his fiancée. He still doesn’t quite believe it.

Khalid Nejem has enemies. His cousins, who mock him with their strength and full Almyran blood. The staff at the palace, some of whom try with varying levels of success to, if not kill him, at least knock him down a peg. Certain groups of people in Almyra, disgusted that a half-breed with Fódlanese blood will be the one to take the throne.

Aziz, Khalid’s eldest cousin, is everything Claude is and Khalid isn’t. Popular, respected, liked, with friends that are more of a royal posse following him around, trying to curry favor. Bahadur, Khalid’s middle cousin, was the general and war hero Claude was and Khalid was not, having seen the most battles of someone in the palace, not including Nader and himself. Mazin, the youngest of Khalid’s cousins, was everything people thought Claude was and Khalid didn’t want to be. Arrogant, manipulative, scheming, but with a skewed sense of morals. The worst of himself and Edelgard combined.

If Khalid had to hazard a guess as to which one would stab him in the back, well... at this moment, he had to say all three.

Despite his aching heart and Byleth’s breath lingering on his lips, Khalid returns home from the Alliance, from the war, from Fódlan, ready to take the throne. Ready to do whatever it took to break down the borders, start crushing this preconceived vein of ignorance and hatred between the two lands, and see Byleth, in that order.

Nader had gone back ages ago, with tales of the great Master Tactician successfully bringing down the Empire’s biggest fortress. In Almyra, power was a key trait, and between that, defeating an ancient, thousand-year old king and stopping a war, the public’s opinion of him was sure to rise.

The opinion of his cousins and non-immediate family members, though? Khalid wasn’t expecting much.

And he was right. Compared to the excitement and awe of his little sister, his cousins weren’t exactly doing a good job of hiding their contempt, their disdain. They had probably wanted him to die there so one of them could step up and take the throne, even despite the fact it would go to Hanaa next.

Really, Khalid almost had, a few times. It was only thanks to Byleth and her Goddess-given gift of being able to reverse the clock that kept it from being permanent. He would ever be grateful for that. His sister was not built to take the throne _(the insults, the hatred)_ like he was, and he shuddered at the thought of one of his cousins taking it.

After all, Fódlan and the Alliance were weak from six years of war, and recovery would be a long road. His cousins would see it as an opportunity to invade the Throat and get their chance at conquest.

There was a lot to be done before Khalid could become king, though. And according to his sister, marriage was one of them.

Hanna had gotten married during Khalid’s time in Fódlan, to a minor noble he hadn’t yet met. Or if he did, he didn’t remember. Balls and gatherings had never been Khalid’s thing. She kept stressing about how it was important for him to find a wife, to secure his claim on the throne, for more curried favors.

And Khalid did have a fiancée. However, Byleth was a secret he wanted to keep to himself. It could be dangerous if the information that he had a fiancée out there somewhere was leaked out. Not that he was worried about assassins - Byleth was more than capable of handling herself, especially now that the Church would watch over their new Archbishop. Khalid just wanted to prove himself as a ruler before the fact he had picked a Fódlanese woman who was once a mercenary and now the Archbishop of the kingdom many Almyrans detested became public.

His letters to Byleth were coded, in a code that used to be Jeralt’s, that only a handful of people knew. He did not mention the fact that the general he fought alongside with in the war was the woman he loved. He kept Byleth’s ring hidden under his glove, so no one saw it. Only himself, Nader and his parents knew who Byleth really was to him, and Khalid wanted it to stay that way.

It does not. He makes it five months before it slips out, early in the Etheral moon. Just two days after what had been Dimitri’s birthday. And although the war is over, the nightmares still linger. Warm blood on his hands and clothes, screams and cries of pain in his ears, the Mad Prince slicing and dicing his way through the battlefield, and the on the ground, bleeding from several non-fatal stab wounds (and one fatal one delivered by his own hand that had put the prince out of his misery).

Dimitri hadn’t quite been a friend. But he’d been an ally, and he was a good man, a good prince. He had deserved better than what the war served to him on a silver platter stained read.

So Khalid, tired and cranky and unnerved, had forgotten to put on his gloves. He hadn’t even realized it until his cousins pointed it out.

“Is that a ring?” Aziz had asked after playing his move, capturing one of Khaid’s pawns, cutting through the haze of hos mind as he tried to focus on the chess game in front of him instead of the nightmares of the past, of Dimitri’s war cries echoing in his ears. Khalid’s head snapped up to Aziz, who had his eyes narrowed, and was pointing down at his hand.

Sure enough, his gloves were off, Byleth’s ring to him settled on his left ring finger and proudly on display.

Setting his jaw, Khalid looked up to meet Bahadur’s gaze. “It is.” His tone was tight, cordial, keeping the venom from seeping out of his mouth and staining the clipped words. He played, moving his rook forward.

“Congratulations.” Bahadur smiled. Thin and tight and not at all congratulatory in any way, shape or form, the words a slow drawl. Aziz moved his own rook.

Khalid smiled wanly in response. “Thanks. It’s really nothing special, though.” He debated going after the rook, but refrained - it was a trap. He moved a simple pawn forward instead.

“Oh, but it is, cousin,” Mazin said with a sly, lazy grin, leaning forward like a wolf on the prowl. There was a dark glint in his eyes Khalid didn’t like. “What’s her name? Perhaps I can... send a gift basket to her. As a wedding gift - an apology for the fact she choose you as her husband.”

Khalid’s eye twitched, smile freezing in place. Aziz smirked and played again.

“No thanks - we’ll be getting enough from our friends as is,” Khalid said, propping his elbow up on the table and leaning into his hand. The epitome of politeness as he responded to Aziz's previous move. After all, a prince was polite. Captured a knight and tossed the black, marble-carved piece to the side. But Aziz could see through his mask.

“Oh, come on, Khalid,” Aziz said, smiling thinly. Khalid’s eyes shifted from Malik to him. “Tell us her name, why don’t you? We’re family, after all.”

“You’re my blood. My family is in Fódlan, with the Deer,” Khalid replied. Aziz played again, his eyes scanning the board, strategizing on how to win, strategizing on how to tear his cousin down. “It takes more than blood to make a family. It takes respect and trust and love, of which I have an abundance with them.”

“Is she strong?” Bahadur asked. Ah, always more focused on the militaristic than manners of the heart. He’d be the easiest one for Byleth to win over. He’d never shown Khalid pure, prejudiced hatred, just mild discontent, and even that seemed to lessen after his victory in the war efforts in Fódlan. After all, he prided himself more on battle prowess than anything else, and Byleth was the best of the best.

Knight to 5-a.

He smirked, thinking about the time she cut a hole open into the sky to get back to them, and killed a thousand-year old legend. “Only one of the best. You can ask Nader if you don’t believe me.”

Pawn to 5-a. Capturing Khalid’s knight. He scowled, assessing the board and what he could do.

Bahadur looked mildly interested.

Mazin snorted, seeing an opportunity to stir the pot. “I think you’re lying. It’s probably just some pretty noblegirl who’s never seen a lick of battle and faints at the sight of blood.”

 _Don’t let him get to you,_ he could hear Byleth saying. _He’s trying to provoke you. Don’t let him._

Khalid tried not to focus on it by moving another piece. Aziz responded. Bahadur looked over some papers. Mazin taunted, poking at Khalid’s mask and walls of patience with a lance, hoping to find or create a crack.

“Or maybe it’s just some boondocks bitch who doesn’t even know what a sword is, much less can handle herself in a fight. I wonder, what did you have to pay her to get her to pretend to be your wife?” Mazin looked to the side, catching Azin’s gaze, his own predatory. “A few bullions, a piece of land? A ship? All the gemstones the vault has? The finest wine in Almyra?”

Khalid stilled. A vein in his forehead popped, and his hand hovered over his bishop, smile freezing in place. Mazin’s grin only grew, eyes gleaming darkly, jaded onyx stones, pouncing on the pot like a cat chasing a mice. With the pompous air almost every noble in the Alliance had, Mazin slid out of his chair and walked over to a nearby table, picking up one of the glasses and the wine bottle there. The sunlight coming through the window reflected off a jade-gemed ring he wore, a cruel mockery of Byleth’s hair and eyes, of the ring he’d given her before he left with the promise he’d come back and start changing the world.

“Or,” he started, his voice dangerously low, taunting, mocking. “Did you just knock someone up?” Mazin turned on Khalid, eyes glinting as sharp as a dagger.

“Hm? Is that what happened? Did you find another way to taint our bloodline with a Fódlanese-bred bastard like your mom did? Is that why you’re so desperate to get back by the end of this summer, to meet said child?”

It wasn’t the first time Khalid had heard stuff like this before. Sex scandles and aldultury and who was sleeping with who - it was just another complext knot in the long, tangled web of Alliance politics. The only thing nobles loved more than a feast, after all, was gossip. Gossip and rumours. Gossip and rumours that were used to raise and tear down statuses as needed, meaning there was no such thing as a private life for a noble. Khalid had been the subject of quite a few gossip groups and rumored his entire time as Claude, about who he was, where he came from, why was he there, even beating out the rumours that Count Gloucester had killed the previous Duke before he came along to take the reigns from Oswald.

Of course, that only lasted until Byleth came into the picture. After that, they would talk about their relationship, the specifics of it, why the leader of the Leicester Alliance and the acting Archbishop of Fódlan spent so much time together. There were various answers to that question, and sex life was a frequent one.

They still echoed in his minds, the rumours that swirled around them when they were in Derdriu.

_“Poor woman… I don’t think she sees what kind of man he is.”_

_“I almost feel bad for her, really. He’s gotta be using her. Why else would they be so close?”_

_“She’ll come to her senses, eventually, when she realizes what kind of snake von Reigan is.”_

Just because the people’s opinions of him were high did not mean the nobles were.  
  
And they came from the same mouths of the ladies and even a few lords who attempted to use him in the same way, giving gifts and flirting and not-so-subtly suggesting marriage so they can have more power, or so he can ‘secure the future of the Reigan line’. Hypocrisy at its finest. And he hated how Byleth would always stiffen up, her mouth pursing into a thin line, the vaguest sense of uncomfortableness in her body language that only the Deer, only Khalid, could read, when she heard them.

He could never be sure of it was the words or the implications that hurt her more. Byleth would refute the statements, say that they were just friends, formerly professor and student, allies, and Khalid would too, but it still didn’t keep them from talking. It never seemed like enough.

Byleth wasn’t here to defend herself and him, say she was with Khalid because he loved him, not because he promised her wealth and status royalty and rose-tinted glasses. And between that and Khalid’s devotion to her, he just couldn’t keep quiet.

Mazin and Aziz had kept talking, trading crude insults and theories back and forth under a façade of politeness, disrespect and hatred masked under diplomacy and handshakes, and even Bahadur, usually neutral in these things, had thrown out a few sly remarks and false assumptions against Khalid’s favor.

The smile fell.

Claude and Khalid were two separate people, two different identities, and yet one and the same, with the same dreams, goals, fears. Khalid was just the younger him, bullied and beaten and crying with bloodied knuckles and built-up resistance to poison. Claude was the mask over the tears, the sunshine smile and false words and strings tied around his fingers, with a sneaking suspicion of everyone and confidence and the skills to back it up. But despite the differences between the person and the persona, there were a few things that stayed the same in each instance

One: He was going to bring down Fódlan’s Throat and break the bottle.

Two: He was the son of Tiana von Reigan.

Three: He was a schemer, a troublemaker, a pain in someone’s side, pulling practical jokes and generally causing chaos when it didn’t matter.

Four: He always wore a smile of some sort. And it was always dangerous when the smile fell away.

The first three were widely known for those who knew Khalid and those who knew Claude. The last one was less known, and something few people saw in Fódlan, fewer in Almyra. Khalid wanted it that way.

His cousins were laughing at him, openly now, façades gone and diplomacy out the window. Khalid watched them for a moment, his position having moved from resting his head on his hand to both arms propped up in front of him, fingers laced together and resting under his nose, and he waited a beat, two, three.

Finally, the laughter died down, and Mazin looked at him, grinning smugly, the angle of the sunlight streaming in from the window covering one half of face in shadows.

“Well? Am I right, Khalid?”

Sighing, Khalid looked down at the chessboard, picking up his bishop again and moving it.

“No. You’re nowhere near correct,” he said simply. The others didn’t pick up the warning tone in his voice.

“First off, she’s a mercenary. Her father was Jeralt the Blade Breaker, and the former Captain of the Knights of Serios. She officially started to join in their expeditions when she turned eleven.”

He’s not really sure if she was eleven, because she wasn’t sure, but it was a well-educated guess, and they didn’t need to know she didn’t know how old she really was until she came to Garreg Mach.

Aziz played.

“She’s 27 now, and between her days as a mercenary and being in a war, I can assure you she’s seen more battles than myself, maybe even Nader.”

Nevermind the fact she was asleep for five years.

Khalid played.

“And she’s traveled all over Fódlan, and knows people from all over the country, even beyond. That’s why she draws her techniques from the Alliance, the Kingdom and the Empire, and why she even knows a few Almyran and Brigidnese moves and fighting styles.”

Aziz played.

“She used to wipe the floor with us when we first sparred against her. She held her own against Judith, and against Lord Holst and Nader. In fact-“

Khalid played, picking up his knight and knocking Aziz’s rook down.

“-she was so good at fighting, so well-known, respected, feared, in battle, she became known as the Ashen Demon.”

Any talk of politics and the future was off the table now. Mazin took a sip of his wine and narrowed his eyes, trying to determine what that look in Khalid’s eyes was. Aziz opened his mouth to respond, but Khalid beat him to it, speaking first.

“Now, before you say anything, she wasn’t just a mercenary. For a brief period a year, she was also a teacher. And despite her lack of knowledge or noble upbringing like some, she excelled at that. Tests were marked fairly and accurately, she always did her best to help us understand a subject, and I frequently caught her up reading in the library at night to teach herself what she didn’t know she so she could teach us. Compared to the one professor who ran off when we got attacked by bandits, the one who could only talk about magic and Crests, and the other who got blackout drunk every other night and came to class with a hangover, she did very well.”

Aziz moved. Khalid kept talking, not giving the others any chance to speak.

“But she didn’t just do that, though. She did so much other stuff for us. When we lost something, she would find it and return it to us. She was always willing to listen to someone speaking and offer advice as needed, or offer them a shoulder to cry on, and did her best to make them feel comfortable around her. She went out of the way to learn what people liked and dislikes, the kind of tea they liked and what topics they liked to talk about.”

Khalid moved, putting Aziz into check with his bishop.

“She gardened with Ashe and Dedue, took care of the horses with Marianne and Bernedetta, fished with Seteth and Flayn, sung in the choir with Mercedes and Dorthea, sparred with Caspar and Felix and Ingrid and Raphael, paint with Bernedetta and Ignatz, learned proper tea etiquette from Ferdinand and Lorenz, shop with Hilda, bake sweets with Annette and Lysithea, hunt with Petra and Leonie, play strategy games against myself and the Monastery’s biggest womanizer, Sylvain. She took the time to learn our favorite foods and what we didn’t like, ate with us, and during the war, would even go out on supply runs to get the ingredients, and she always took care to make sure we were safe in battle, even taking fatal hits if needed, just so we could survive.”

Studying Khalid with wary eyes, Aziz looked down at the chessboard, quickly turning into Khalid’s favor. He moved his king left.

“Her strength was valued, I won’t lie, not at first.” Khalid moved a rook forward, on the other side of Aziz’s king. “But over the months, I got to know her. Imagine how surprised I was when she didn’t give a damn about my being half-Almyran, something many people would’ve shunned me for. She was there, watching my back, when we fought, something no one had ever really done before, and I think that’s part of the reason why I feel for her. I trust her to not betray me. Meanwhile, you’d all sooner turn around and stab me for a chance to sit on the throne.”

He looked up, meeting Aziz’s gaze with dark jade eyes. Aziz gulped, and looked down at the board, moving his king diagonally to the left one, keeping his king on the black square, away from the bishop, then glared up at Khalid.

Khalid tilted his head.

“Oh, come now, you three. Don’t lie. We all know that you’d stab me in the back as soon as you got the chance. It’s something I expect from you at this point, honestly.”

He glanced down and moved one of his pawns forward.

Aziz moved his king to the left, unease rolling off him.

“I mean, I’m used to it,” Khalid continued, looking up from the board, his hands still laced in front of him. “Fifteen years of anger, of disgust, skepticism. At this point, I can handle it.” He sighed. “I can handle the cruel names, the asssasstion attempts, the rumours, the venomous glares. I may not deserve it, but I’m used to it.”

Then he leaned forward, bringing his chin up and resting it on his hands.

“But Byleth? She doesn’t deserve that. She’s the best person I’ve ever met, and it sometimes feels as if though I don’t deserve her.”

“You don’t.” Mazin’s voice cut through the thick tension that had started to bleed out from Khalid’s tones, words, posture. It was the clash of steel on steel in the silence of the room. Khalid leaned back in his chair, raising a brow, a silent response to go on. “Prince though you may be, it doesn’t change who you are as a person. A half-breed coward. The woman you are to marry is no better.”

Khalid blinked, his eyes two dark gems of uncut jade. Then he sighed, pulling his hands back and behind his head, lacing his fingers together.

Grinned. It was a rare grin, a devious, poisoned-tipped one Mazin doesn’t ever recall seeing from his cousin. Jagged. Dangerous. Deadly. The tip of a dagger, all sharp angles and jagged edges, dark and dangerous, a slip under his carefully crafted masks at the schemer and tactician, the boy forced to grow up too fast, the survivor of a war, underneath. The air seemed to shift.

“See? That’s exactly what I mean. I’m not sure I deserve that. And I know for a fact Byleth doesn’t deserve that either.”

With that, he stood up, leaning forward and planting his hands on the desk. The smile fell from his face, a frozen, stinging blast of winter air that sent goosebumps rising on the skin of his cousins.

“So, go ahead. Make fun of me. Tell me everything I’ve heard for the entirety of my life, tell me all the ways I’m not a prince.”

He reached forward, picking up the piece he needed to put Aziz in checkmate.

“But Byleth Eisner is my queen, so don’t you dare mock or disrespect her.”

If looks could kill, Khalid would be dead and the three of them would be dead three times over as Khalid set down his queen. He smiled up at his cousins, expression hard and cold and dangerous, gaze dark.

Smile of a wolf. Eyes of a killer. Body marred with scars from a war that wasn’t his but still haunted him nonetheless, mind plagued with nightmares of enemies and allies alike dying, of Byleth dying. Hands dyed red with blood of those who died by his own arrows.

A far cry from the hunched, shaking boy who had left them. He wasn’t just a prince now, but he was a general, the former leader of the Leicester Alliance and a future king.

“Checkmate.”

**Author's Note:**

> I firmly headcanon that absolutely no one will make fun of Byleth within Claude’s hearing range b/c he’ll either smite them on principal or slip stomach poison into their food. Plus, he would absolutely be the John Mulaney meme of “That’s my wife!!”


End file.
